The craft brewing sector is entering advanced technical training courses as an agri-food sector to be explored, studied and promoted. At theITS Academy Agrorisorse in Lodi, a training course developed in collaboration with Unionbirrai, the trade association of small independent craft breweries, dedicated to the brewing industry and its prospects for innovation and sustainability, has come to an end. This initiative comes in a particularly significant year: in 2026, the Italian brewing movement celebrates its first 30 years, an anniversary that Unionbirrai celebrates with “Buona questa Birra”, the national project that involves over a hundred breweries in collective and shared brewing events throughout the country.
As part of this course, Secretary General Simone Monetti gave a lecture on the production of beer and the processing of raw materials. His contribution was part of the ITS Food Tech course, in a module created together with the Lombardy institute to offer students a technical and up-to-date interpretation of craft beer as an agri-food supply chain.
The course looks at agri-food supply chains not only from a production point of view, but also in terms of quality, sustainability, business organisation and the skills required by the market. The focus of the lesson was the story of the brewing supply chain: from raw materials to processing, from the role of barley and hops to production techniques, up to the challenges facing the sector in terms of innovation, sourcing, environmental sustainability and the promotion of craft products.
“Craft beer is not just a product to be tasted, but a complete agri-food supply chain,” says Simone Monetti, Secretary General of Unionbirrai . “Inside a glass of beer there is agriculture, processing, technology, production skills, quality control, regulations, consumer culture and the relationship with the local area. Bringing this content to an ITS means offering students a concrete understanding of a sector that can generate new and highly sought-after professional skills“.
The collaboration with ITS Agrorisorse has already led to the creation of three training courses with the involvement of teachers, professionals and figures linked to the world of Unionbirrai and Unionbirrai Beer Taster. The topics covered in the various modules include brewing production, product quality, the processing of raw materials, technical tasting, regulatory and management aspects, and the relationship between craft beer, the local area and sustainability.
In the course launched in Lodi, Unionbirrai contributed a module of about 80 hours as part of a broader programme dedicated to sustainability and innovation in agri-food supply chains. This experience confirms the growing interest of the education system in Italian craft beer, not only as a cultural and production phenomenon, but as a sector that requires increasingly specialised technical, managerial and sensory skills.
“The ITSs play a fundamental role because they train professionals who can be immediately put to use in companies,” adds Monetti. “We are willing to work with the institutes concerned to create tailor-made training courses: short or more structured modules, technical lessons, brewery visits, in-depth studies on raw materials, regulations, tasting and quality management. Each institution has different needs, and the added value lies precisely in the possibility of adapting the content to existing courses“.
For Unionbirrai, the experience with ITS Agrorisorse also represents a model of collaboration that can be replicated with other higher technical institutes interested in expanding the brewing supply chain within their programmes. An opportunity to bring students closer to a sector that combines agricultural, food, technological and entrepreneurial skills, contributing to the growth of a new professional culture of Italian craft beer.
